Supramolecular chemistry is a relatively young branch of chemistry having undergone much of its development in the latter half of the 20th century [1]. The reason for this is twofold, firstly a thorough understanding of synthetic methods resulting in supramolecular systems was needed and secondly, powerful analytical technology used in structure elucidation and in physico-chemical property determination needed to be developed [1]. Analytical techniques that have been successfully employed in this regard include UV-visible, florescence-, and infra-red spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance, powder X-ray diffraction and most importantly single-crystal X-ray diffraction [1]. Subsequently, the interest in supramolecular chemistry and the understanding of and rational design of property specific materials has increased over the last fifty years making supramolecular chemistry one of the fastest growing and most interdisciplinary areas in chemistry [1, 2, 3]. The quest to be able to manipulate and predict the nature of intermolecular forces in the design of property specific supramolecular entities remains one of the greatest scientific challenges of our day [1, 4, 5, 6].
One of the most studied areas at the moment is the formation of novel metal-organic frameworks (MOF's) and coordination polymers due to the possibility of using metal ions to align molecules in a desired direction [3, 7, 8]. One-dimensional (1D) coordination polymers have been extensively researched and subject to many review articles. It has been envisaged that these supramolecular materials could be used as molecular ferromagnets, metallic and superconducting polymers, non-linear optical materials and ferroelectric materials [9]. In more recent times the research focus has been aimed at magnetism and in particular room-temperature and near-room temperature molecular magnets [10-12]. The close packing of metal ions in a one-dimensional coordination polymer is favoured for the formation of functional materials characterized by displaying at least one physico-chemical property known to the group comprising: molecular ferromagnets, metallic and superconducting polymers, non-linear optical materials, ferroelectric materials and molecular magnets.
One of the chief problems encountered in this area of research is finding reliable methods for producing materials with interesting and possibly useful properties. Additionally, new materials showing promising physico-chemical properties are often extremely difficult to characterize and the exact formula and/or crystal structure of many of these materials remains unknown. Methods of ensuring successful single-crystal formation suitable for single-crystal X-ray diffraction need to be developed.